The following was forwarded to the office of Congressman Michael McMahon:

Dear Congressman McMahon:

The upcoming improvements to the Staten Island Expressway leave something to be desired. In particular, the extension of the so-called bus lane is troubling in that it has not, in fact, been a bus lane for the past couple of years. It has instead been an HOV-2 lane that has, at times, become a lane as congested as all the rest.

The switch over to its present HOV-2 designation has your fingerprints all over it. Yes, you did stipulate that you would agree to cars utilizing the lane if enforcement took place. The only trouble with that reasoning is that the engineers that designed the lane left no room to pull violators off so that they can be properly ticketed.

The extension of the “bus lane” will mandate that sound barriers — in the form of walls — be offered to residents in the vicinity of the work. According to federal law, those residents have the choice of saying yes or no to these walls and that is it.

Why not an alternative such as trees? Trees are a good idea as they:

1) Are a sound barrier;

2) Do capture pollutants and convert them into oxygen;

3) Are aesthetically pleasing;

4) Are not prone to being tagged (remember graffiti).

Please go about proposing legislation that will eliminate this false choice of walls or no walls. Do we really need to spend millions of dollars on walls when government is reeling? Trees rock!